You set the tone
by Ocean of Ashes
Summary: Abby's thoughts and feelings at the end of her final shift as an intern, sparked by Carter's departure. Season 11 finale


Disclaimer: All characters and settings related to the ER are not mine.

Author's Note: This is not my usual thing, in that it's about Abby. I just rewatched the season eleven finale, and I think it's one of the best episodes I've seen, and this has been rattling around in my head ever since. I am a very firm fan of Luka and Abby together, don't get me wrong, but Abby and Carter had this tragic intensity or sense of doom or whatever about them that I think made for some pretty powerful stuff, and I think the writers missed the chance to give them something more meaningful by way of goodbye. So this is it.

When Abby finally got home after her shift, she was exhausted. Her eyes stung with tiredness and every bone in her body ached. She wanted nothing more than to crawl into bed and sleep for a hundred years, but there was something she had to do first.

The moment he'd handed her the letter he'd written to himself as an intern, she had seen there were two pieces of paper in the envelope. She hadn't said a word to Ray and Neela, but slipped it in her pocket, where it had been burning a hole ever since. She didn't know for sure what the second piece of paper was, but in preparation of finding out, she'd stopped on the way home to buy wine and cigarettes. She knew she wasn't allowed either, but this one last time, she would sit back and savour the forbidden pleasures, or eternal vices, whichever you preferred, and reflect on the past. She'd only bought a minute bottle of wine, a rich looking cabernet sauvignon just enough for a single glass, and of the pack of cigarettes she bought, she took one out and slipped it carefully into her handbag, throwing the rest in the trash right outside the shop.

She curled up on the sofa, legs tucked underneath her, and flicked on the lamp beside her, bathing herself in a soft, golden glow. She took the glass of wine in her hand, inhaling its scent deeply, before taking a sip. She lit the cigarette then, and rested her head back and waited as the sweet relaxation of the alcohol and nicotine diffusing through her body hit her. Finally, she felt able to tackle the envelope, and reached into it with slightly trembling hands.

_Dear Abby,_

_I'm writing this letter because I'm a weak, spineless coward who can't find it within himself to say goodbye to your face, not a proper goodbye anyway, not the goodbye we both know you deserve._

She had known it would be a letter. She had known that there had to be more to his goodbye than an intense look and a moving pep talk that she had to share with Ray and Neela as well. She didn't think he was a coward for not saying goodbye; she would have done the same, and a letter lasted forever. Words were carried away by a breath of wind and lost all too quickly.

_I've never met anyone like you, Abby Lockhart. Every day you've known me, you've challenged me and made me think about what I do and how I feel far more deeply than I would have liked to. You know what's beneath you see, beneath the Associate Professorship and now, the humanitarian leanings. You know the real John Carter because, I think, you're the first person who has ever really taken the time to look. I'm sorry it wasn't a pretty sight!_

She did know him, better sometimes than he knew himself. She knew when he was hurting, and when he was angry, and more, what to say to ease the pain. Nothing could take it away, but she could lessen it a bit. Everyone had always thought it was her with problems, the crazy family, the absent father, the alcoholism, but one look in his tortured brown eyes, and there had only ever been one of them who was in real need of fixing.

_I know that by my actions I forfeited any right that I may have had to say this to you a long time ago, but I love you, and wherever this new journey leads me, I will always carry you with me in my heart. I don't know if I mean that as friends, or as something more, but I don't think it matters now. _

He was absolutely right, she thought, on both counts. He _didn't_ have any right at all to say that to her after what he had done, but that didn't mean she wasn't glad he had said it. And whether he loved her as a friend or as a lover was irrelevant. The lines were blurred.

_I have a list of apologies to make to you as well. I'm sorry if you don't want to hear them, but I'm going to say them anyway. I'm sorry for hurting you, for every time I have made you cry, for every time I have made you look at a bottle of vodka and think it was a good idea. I'm sorry for the way I left you, and I'm sorry for Kem. But most of all, I'm sorry for not being able to accept you for who you were. As your mother once said to me, I seemed hell bent on trying to fix you, when you didn't need fixing. I never meant to, but looking at you when you were at your self destructive worst was like looking into a mirror at myself, and I couldn't bear to see the reflection that was staring back at me. _

Again, he knew her so well. She didn't want to hear his apologies. What was done was done, and even though they may have some regrets about the path they had stumbled along, there was nothing to be gained from revisiting the past, except to learn from their mistakes. And as he had said, there had been plenty of mistakes, not just his, but hers also. The drinking, the self destruction. The standing there with Carter, but with Luka hovering in the corner of her eye, the corner of her mind.

_I hope fervently that this new chapter of my life I am embarking on will bring me happiness, but I hope for that happiness even more so for you, as you are by far the most deserving. By the time you read this letter, you will have finished your last shift as an intern. Words cannot describe how proud I am of you and what you have achieved. I have no doubt that one day, these crowded corridors will echo the name Lockhart as they now do Greene, Ross, Benton, and, I guess, Carter._

She didn't share the same fear as he had as an intern. She didn't have that raw terror that came with inexperience; hers was self-doubt, a far deeper and more damaging emotion, but his words were the final part of something that had occurred today that had erased that doubt. Luka had left her running the floor tonight, and she had run it like the doctor she had dreamed that she could be. Ray had begged her to take those traumas, and she had stepped up. She and Ray and Neela had all laid to rest that ghost of self-doubt tonight. It didn't mean they weren't still petrified, but there was belief there now. And for her, if not the other two, knowing that Carter believed she could do it was as much as a salve to her soul as believing it herself.

_I intended to make this letter much longer, but I think I have said my piece. Goodbye, Abby. If our paths don't cross again, then I wish you happiness and success with all my heart. I'm sorry to be leaving your life, but am honoured that you let me be a part of it. _

You_ set the tone, Abby._

_With love,_

_John Carter._

Without Carter in her life, she may never have reached this point in her life, but she might have done. It was impossible to tell. All she was sure of was, as she drained the last drop of wine to ever pass her lips, and took the final drag from her last cigarette, she was damn glad he had been a part of it.


End file.
